CHINA HAILS FINDS AT ANCIENT TOMB

By JOHN F. BURNS, Special to the New York Times

Published: May 4, 1986

PEKING, April 30—
Reports of fresh archeological discoveries come virtually every week in what Chinese archeologists have described as the greatest era of discovery since their science took root here in the 19th century. But the superlatives have rarely rolled out as they have for the huge tomb attributed to a slave-owning duke who lived more than 2,500 years ago.

The 10-year excavation of the tomb of Duke Jing of the state of Qin, who is believed to have died in 537 B.C., is described as the most extensive ever undertaken in China.

The tomb has stunned archeologists with its sheer size. The Guangming Daily, a newspaper specializing in cultural matters, described it as being as deep as an eight-story building and as large as a palace.

There is excitement as well because of its age. The tomb was constructed about the same time that the philosopher Confucius was wandering fruitlessly through what is now Central China in search of a post he considered worthy of his talents. Although it is not the oldest tomb uncovered, archeologists at the site say it has yielded a wealth of fresh data about the slave society that existed in Western China in the time of Confucius. Bonanza for Scholars

''All the scholars who have seen the tomb were amazed,'' The Guangming Daily said in a major article this week. '' 'Incredible' and 'breathtaking' are typical of the words they have used.''

The tomb lies in the heart of ancient China, close to the Yellow River in the uplands of Shaanxi Province about 600 miles southwest of Peking. The date of its construction puts it toward the close of what Chinese historians know as the Spring and Autumn Period, when a group of petty states covered the North China Plain. Unification came more than three centuries later under the tyrant Emperor Chin Shih Huang.

The publicity accorded recent archeological finds has fed a mood of renascent interest in the country's past. Deng Xiaoping, the country's paramount leader, has broken sharply with Government policy under Mao Zedong, when China's ancient societies were held up for political condemnation. The 81-year-old Mr. Deng, impatient of Marxist exigencies, believes that all Chinese should get to know the extraordinary accomplishments of their ancestors so as to foster national pride.

Accordingly, budgets for archeological and historical research have been increased manyfold, and scholars who were persecuted and driven from the field have been restored to their old positions and bestowed with honors. The response has been an explosion of activity, with more than 1,000 sanctioned digs now in progress. Peasant Leads Way to Treasures

News accounts this week said that scholars had long searched for the site of the tomb of Duke Jing, whose existence was logged in ancient chronicles. The breakthrough came in 1976, when a peasant who mistook a team of archeologists for treasure hunters led them into a field where he had found pieces of bronze and other clues that there was a tomb nearby.

The dig, in Fengxiang County, about 80 miles west of the ancient capital of Xian, proved to be the most arduous of any attempted here.

When the digging was completed, the tomb was found to be in the shape of an inverted pyramid without a peak. The Guangming Daily gave the dimensions at the surface as nearly 200 feet by 130 feet, and at the base as 120 feet by 65 feet. Between top and bottom, it measured more than 80 feet, with access tunnels to either side that were more than 900 feet long and large enough, in The Guangming Daily's phrase, to contain more than 200 dump trucks.

The newspaper said the measurements made the tomb more than 21 times the size of another famous tomb discovery near Changsha.

The main clue to the identity of the Fengxiang tomb was provided by the discovery of two stone chimes of the kind frequently found in ancient Chinese tombs, each inscribed with ancient characters indicating that the occupant was Duke Jing.

The tomb is not the oldest to have been excavated. At least one emperor's tomb from the Shang dynasty, thought to be at least 3,500 years old, has been unearthed, but it was a fraction of the size of the Fengxiang find. Nor, apparently, will the tomb yield any treasures to compare with the buried army of life-sized terra cotta figures discovered in 1974 at the approaches to the Emperor Chin Shih Huang's tomb outside Xian. The army has become China's largest tourist attraction, drawing more than two million visitors a year. #180 Coffins Are Found The historical chronicles say that the Fengxiang tomb was looted several times in the Tang and Sung dynasties, between the 7th and 13th centuries A.D.. Nonetheless, the dig has produced 180 coffins containing human remains, thought by the archeologists to be those of court retainers slain or buried alive so as to be able to serve the Duke in the afterlife.

The Guangming Daily said coffins already opened had produced skeletons of men and women, along with tools, dyes for bronzes and other metal implements and jewelery.

None of the articles said when the tomb will be opened to tourists, but if past practice is followed this is likely to be some time. However, the authorities in Xian and the surrounding area have major plans to expand foreign tourism, creating the possibility that the opening of the tomb to visitors may be expedited.